Twilight
by incandescience
Summary: Yaten thinks back on his visits to Earth, and the girl who captured his thoughts.


Disclaimer: SM and etc don't belong to me, or else I'd be rich. Mmph. Though plotlines do...

Just a quick oneshot on two characters that aren't commonly noticed in the rampaging bull horde of fanfics known as Usagi x Mamoru. But, we're not in Pamplona, so that's okay.

**Twilight** by imotionette**  
**

Star Healer, they call him, but what's the use when he can't even fix his own planet?

But it's worth getting bogged down in this crapload of shit, or administrative work, if it means Seiya and Kakyuu can take their honeymoon away from the prying eyes and whispers of Council members eager to curry favor and snipe at them. Of course, they were always too busy making googly eyes over the Council table to notice anyways. In his mind, Usagi was always too bubbly and bouncy for Sei. Besides, she was already promised away to that rose-boy, as he's nicknamed Mamoru. Who doesn't really appreciate it, but since Haruka seems to find it amusing, there's not much he can do, or else it gets her sarcastic humor added into the mix.

He thinks back on his last visit to Terra with an almost wistful sigh, reminded of her, that twilight colored ribbon resting on a picture frame, filled by her picture, with her dark eyes smiling up at him. He doesn't really remember the first time he went to Terra as a singer, and supposedly loved by his fans, he remembers the battles, he remembers the snippets of the Senshi, and one in particular, a child then, with eyes older than they should have been. She'd always laugh as she danced in the rain, unafraid of sickness or disease – yet what's to be afraid of, of course, when Thanatos walks in the shadows by your side and Hades is your father?

But she really hadn't struck him that much back then, except in the way he had been utterly charmed by her polite manners, well, even though he hated little kids and slightly intimidated by the fact she could hold a bigass scythe, glaive, whatever she wanted to call it and use it too. (She really does embody the term speak softly and carry a big stick, a phrase that stuck out while he listened to Ami study out loud.) She was different than the older Senshi though, and that made him wish just a tiny bit for her company more often instead of ..well that's a little harsh to think about, he did love the other Senshi in their own way.

He twists the twilight colored ribbon around in his hands. It was odd how in the few years, well nearly close to a decade that he'd been away from Terra, how much she had changed. Most of the Senshi had. All of them had been paired up, surprisingly, as Mamoru resurrected his own guards, (and almost had to again, he thinks with a wry smile, as he'd been witness to Haruka and Rei nearly murdering them and Mamoru), except for her, as she was, different. She'd matured from polite, eerie child, into someone almost as mysterious as Setsuna, and able to match his own dry smile with a quiet one of her own. It drew him in, in a way – polar opposites in their bases, Death and Healer, heck even their astrological signs were incompatible – but they'd managed to work it out anyways. Maybe it was just a circumstantial thing, seeing as how all the Inners and Shittennou were together, Haruka and Michiru, and it left her alone, but it didn't explain the spark of attraction (or was it just shock?) when he realized that in his absence, she'd turned into an elegant woman, and well, with piano skills that he'd probably kill for. Although it took a damn long time for him to realize that (almost a month, he thinks) on Earth, seeing as he had been a cesspool of emotion, drawn almost to the brink through the responsibility he had in re-establishing Kinmoku, or it might have been the day he spent talking to her over tea, while they were cooped up in her apartment, due to the monsoon storm outside (really, he didn't have anywhere else to go, and her apartment was the closest, although she chastised him as he really shouldn't have been outside anyways)

But appreciation for music and arts (fostered on her by her surrogate parents) had given them a common ground to start from that day, and well, at least once he got over his emotional state Haruka didn't hate him as much anymore, but even then, a few weeks later, he still carefully edged around her and asked instead Michiru if it was alright to take their daughter out for an opera and a dinner one night. Turquoise eyes just gave him a knowing look, which made him sink metaphorically down into the floor and wonder if he really was that transparent. It'd gone well from there, and he well, wasn't sure how it'd all work out, being a few thousand light miles away in a week, but another small smile from her pale lips, free from lipstick or gloss, convinced him everything would be okay, and she'd reached up and hugged him and he couldn't think about anything but her and what he wanted to do, and then just gave and pressed his own mouth gently down onto hers, tasting the aloe vera and ginger in her lip balm, and chocolate from the cake they'd shared and as she smiled against his lips all he could think of was oh stars she was so soft. He remembers that part pretty clearly.

He felt like those next six days were heaven, just simply breathing in a goddess's love, and before he had known it, he'd have to leave his little bright star and leave Sol back to Kinmoku and it nearly broke his heart, but she'd smiled again and with an elegant flick of her wrist, gifted a small crystal, dangling from an earring, almost exactly like the one on her uniform, and when he demands she tell him where she got it from, she just laughs and kisses him oh so sweetly again, tucked neatly in the crook of his arm, and then pulls her twilight colored ribbon (which reminds him of the color of that night where he first kissed her) from her silken hair, tying it into his silver strands. What looks perfect on her violet hair, also ironically does on his, and she smiles again at the result, eyes slightly brighter than normal.

"This is the end, isn't it?" He asked softly.  
"Nothing ever ends," is her soft promise, and she's the one who should know that best, anyways.

But he's lightmiles away from Terra now, and he's not so sure anymore, even though its only been a month later, because men really can charm their ways into a life that quickly, and fiddling with the crystal dangling from an earlobe, just thinking about how ironic it is that he's the Healer and Death's the one who saves him from himself and emotional trainwrecks. A soft tap on the door reveals Taiki, who gives him a -look- and says its a transmission from Earth, and he just damn well kicks over the chair and runs down to the communication room, but its not just any transmission, cuz his firefly's sitting in the chair facing the door.

He, normally so composed, stumbles over the door frame in disbelief, nearly straight into her, and Hotaru laughs, and he thinks he's never heard a sweeter sound in his life.

"I hope that's not the only welcome I'm getting, Yaten."  
"Damn right it isn't." And then he shows her what his definition of a real welcome is, and she couldn't be happier.


End file.
